


Critical Studies In Crystallized Uniqueness Theory

by amorremanet



Category: Community
Genre: 30 days of drabbles, Bisexuality, Character Study, Crush, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode: s02e15 Early 21st Century Romanticism, F/F, Fluff and Angst, POV Bisexual Character, Secret Admirer, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-07
Updated: 2012-06-07
Packaged: 2017-11-07 06:03:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,024
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/427714
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amorremanet/pseuds/amorremanet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>This is when Claire should really find a spine or an excuse to leave. Either works.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Critical Studies In Crystallized Uniqueness Theory

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the prompt, "snowflake." I found Claire's name from her listing on IMDB.

Claire waits for Britta to leave before trying to talk to Annie again. She's trying to pay attention to Britta. Really, she is. It'd be impolite to ignore her. But Claire can't help looking at Annie while Britta's speaking.

Besides, it's not exactly like Claire can be upset about Britta acting like she was going away to class or whatever it is she does with her time when she's not being pedantic, then coming back because she just had to clarify more things about homophobia for Annie. Claire can't act like that because the only thing Britta interrupted was Claire failing to think of anything she could say to Annie.

Not that she has no ideas, period. She has a small mountain of journal entries and story drafts and creative writing exercises full of things she wants to say to Annie Edison. It's just that all of Claire's ideas suck, and she can't just pull out words from nowhere like Britta's doing now.

It helps a little that Britta doesn't seem to know what she's talking about. At least, Claire's pretty sure that open-mindedness doesn't mean what Britta thinks it means.

It helps more that she's so invested in getting a reaction out of Annie, riling her up or something. Like Britta does with everyone, except it's affectionate, how she's doing it to Annie. But Annie's reactions are supposed to be important, right now. That's a perfect excuse to look at Annie instead. So Claire does, and kind of wishes she'd resisted the temptation instead. Because Claire feels her chest clench up, and she has to gasp for breath, which makes her feel so stupid and completely freaky.

Because normal people like to make out as though they don't just have reactions like this in the middle of the cafeteria. So Claire must be a freak. Except most normal people would probably act like her, in this moment.

Because Annie Edison's face is flawless. And Annie Edison's personality is magical. And Annie Edison gives Claire this apologetic smile like she's saying, _I know Britta's trying way too hard, and she most likely doesn't know what she wants to say, and it's probably irritating, but I swear she's better than this, sometimes, and anyway, she's my friend, you know_ —and it's just too pretty, Claire has no idea what to say to it.

Her heart flutters a little, just to look at Annie and all her perfect teeth and think _Annie Edison is smiling **at me**_ —well. Her heart flutters more than a little. _Way_ more than a little. More like really kind of a lot. More like cause to worry that this is what a heart attack feels like. More like, "enough to make Claire's whole chest feel the ripples from her heart going wacky on her, and she's just doing the 'minimizing her emotions and pretending they're less than they are' thing that her therapist tells her not to do."

But it's even more than that, really. It's more like the worst feeling ever, in the world, because Claire's either going to be sick or make a total ass of herself, and she'll probably still have this gross, skin-crawl feeling of impending drama.

It's more like, "Claire's heart bangs around her chest like a screen door in a hurricane, and her knees have gone all wobbly but not just because she's still not sure about the heels on these shoes, and everything she can think of to describe how she feels is the sort of purple prose, romance novel crap that got her laughed at in every meeting of her creative writing class from last semester, but there _really_ ought to be a gaussian filter over everything and some dreamy, sparkly love song playing in the background, maybe with a piano and a nice strings section."

Claire wouldn't care if she got laughed at in a million creative writing classes for the rest of eternity if she could just get Annie to smile at her for something she did, not because Annie's apologizing for Britta.

Except that nobody's ever smiled at Claire like that, and Annie wouldn't smile at her, not the way Claire wants. Because Annie has standards and she's not a lesbian. Which is fine, because she could be bisexual. Like Claire. But she still probably wouldn't smile at Claire, if she were either. Claire can't even talk to her.

What sort of person would smile at somebody who can hardly say two sentences to them?

This conversation was supposed to go differently. For one thing, it was supposed to be an actual conversation. But Claire tripped herself up like always. She couldn't even make a good first impression with Annie just now, and she really should've been able to manage that. Paige has been giving Claire lessons on making good first impressions. Paige helped part Claire's hair just right and pick out Claire's sweater and make her look her best because that's part of making a good first impression.

(Good thing, too, because otherwise, Claire would've tried to too subtly play into how much Annie loves their school and worn an all-green top that, according to Paige, "totally washes out her complexion"—not that Paige cares or reads her secret stash of _Cosmo_ back-issues when no one else is around or anything.)

She did all of this for Claire because Paige is the greatest best friend Claire's ever had. She did it pretty much solely so Claire would get over herself and her nerves and just talk to Annie, maybe ask her out for coffee, and now? Well, no big deal, but now, Claire's kind of shot down everything Paige did for her like the bad ex in Paige's favorite Bon Jovi song.

Claire's cheeks flush all hot and pink as the conversation replays itself in her head. Thankfully, Annie doesn't seem to notice—she's still busy listening to Britta talk about how much of a homophobe she's not. And Britta doesn't notice, either, though Britta kind of seems like she misses a lot of things. Not least the memo that constantly talking about your _lesbian friend_ really isn't that smooth a move.

Not that Claire can really judge her, though. At least Britta can talk to the people _she_ has feelings for. Dammit. Just. Dammit. Why did she have to say that she's not a lesbian. Why did she have to go and spit that out when Annie didn't ask about it, and Annie was just trying to be nice by coming over to say hello, and it _wasn't relevant_. Why did she have to make herself sound so spastic and stupid and _gross_. Annie probably didn't even care.

Never mind that Claire's _not_ a lesbian. Of everyone else at this school, Annie's probably one of the last people who'd assume that Claire's gay because she hangs out with Paige. Annie probably knows what it's like in Claire's shoes. Having a not-lesbian friend who everybody thinks is gay, so they think you're gay, too because otherwise you wouldn't be friends with her.

At least, that's the logic that Paige would use. She's said almost exactly that before, several times. All of them happened in moments when Claire thought it might be better to break herself of this, stop obsessing over Annie because they're never going to happen. It might've been for the best if Claire had stuck to her convictions, then. Maybe Claire wouldn't be so lost and hopeless and socially graceless now.

But every single time, Paige decided to tempt Claire back into caring by repeating some story she'd heard about Annie from someone else. Which always worked. And Paige knew it would always work. So Claire stopped denying her interest, and Paige justified toying with her like that by talking about all the common ground that Claire and Annie probably have, if they'd just get to know each other. Like, if Claire would start things off for them, since Princess Annie can't come find someone she doesn't really know.

Which, without fail, was really more like complaining about how so many people think Paige is a lesbian and God, why are they all so presumptuous and homophobic. Which Claire thinks is a lot of exaggeration on Paige's part, since she's the one getting offended and defensive about people thinking she's gay, and kind of acting like it's a bad thing? And she kind of does the exact same thing when she talks about Britta? And Claire's really not sure that homophobia works this way?

Claire _is_ sure that she doesn't know enough about how homophobia works to say anything about it.

And anyway, Paige's intent is always to be a good friend, when she plays into (and maybe takes advantage of?) how much Claire likes talking about Annie. Her heart's really in the right place. She's just not that aware of how she comes off sometimes, and she's over-enthusiastic, and she tries way, way too hard to always be right.

…but Paige is helpful when she puts her mind to it, and she really doesn't have that many other friends.

So Claire doesn't forgive her because there's nothing to forgive her _for_ , right? Right. Nobody's perfect, and everybody kind of steps on everybody's feelings now and then, right? Right. Besides, she does everything with good intentions and that's enough, even for the part where she regularly makes Claire feel like a stalker by reminding her just how sort-of-kind-of-really-too-much she cares about what Annie's up to. No forgiveness necessary, not really, because everybody's human and a screw-up, right? …Right.

Besides, it's all on Claire to figure out how she feels and take responsibility for it. Maybe she wouldn't feel like a stalker if she'd just talk _to_ Annie instead of _about_ her. Even though it's not like it's creepy and weird to like talking about the girl she's crushing on, is it? Claire had to listen to Paige do the same thing over Neil, until Neil started dating Vicki and Paige started talking about Britta all the time instead.

Not that Claire has any reason to think the two situations aren't exactly the same. Not that she's been, just say for instance, casually, distantly, not really intently following gossip about Annie's study group for over a year now. Not that she's made excuses for that interest ever since sitting opposite Annie's favorite work station in Beginner Pottery.

Not that she died a little bit when Paige started hanging out with Britta because it could've been a great excuse to maybe hang out with Annie. Not that she's still kicking herself for chickening out, and telling herself all sorts of fatalistic crap, and passing up all the opportunities to follow Paige to some outing where Claire could try talking to Annie in some forum that isn't her imagination.

Not that she's tried to cover up all her blatant fishing for any random news about Annie by saying things like, _I just kind of like to gossip sometimes, it's a dirty little secret of mine like how Paige auditioned for American Idol that one time and hand-makes custom dresses for her Iron Man and Captain America dolls_ , or _It's just hard not to be interested in that study group, you know? It's not like there are a lot of people at Greendale and those seven kind of do a lot of interesting stuff_.

Not that her Anthropology notes are full of little cartoon doodles of Jeff Winger and Rich Stephenson with sharp things and some of Professor Bauer's decorative weapons sticking out of various orifices. Or of Troy Barnes making out with his spindly, socially awkward boyfriend.

Because Claire absolutely doesn't irrationally hate Jeff for the story about him frenching Annie and how he turned around to mack on Britta _right in front of her_. And Claire doesn't spend a lot of Duncan's Anthropology lectures narrowing her eyes at the back of Rich's head, wishing she had heat vision, or at least that she was more interested in class, or in watching Vicki and Neil flirt, or something other than fantasizing about flicking rubberbands at Rich.

Claire's limited to fantasizing not so much because of any inhibitions she has. It's just because she has no idea how to flick rubberbands. They never go anywhere, they just fall off her pencil and make her feel like an idiot because even her kid brother can flick a stupid rubberband. But it doesn't really matter because Claire isn't jealous over any of the guys who get near Annie and hurt her, because that would be silly. Because Annie doesn't even know who Claire is, aside from, "Paige's weird friend."

And Claire didn't write a story for her class where some guy named Ricky Stephenbrook had a cute, sweet girl named Hannah Franklin interested in him, even though he's really boring and then he disrespected her, so she turned out to be a wizard and summoned a man-eating tiger named Fluffy, which then ate him. And Claire hasn't done similar things to characters named Geoff Glider, Fredo Alappe, or Jeph Pinions. And Claire never, ever needs to remind herself that Troy isn't her competition because he's with Abed, and even if he weren't, Annie's not a prize to be won.

Not that Claire regularly needs to remind herself of how Annie isn't a prize to be won or anything, period, without the added context of the competition she's not in with Troy. Except that she does. Except that she's kind of just as bad as the guys she barely knows, just dislikes from a distance because they get anywhere near a girl who doesn't even know her name. Because that's totally any kind of well-balanced and doesn't make Claire sound completely insane.

And now she's being sarcastic and self-effacing again. Kind of a lot. Her shrink says Claire does this to make herself feel distanced from her emotions, because it's harder for them to hurt her if she can dismiss them. Claire thinks she does this because Annie Edison is so pretty, and smart, and nice and sweet, but not too nice or too sweet—like, she's not going to give Claire a cavity, and she doesn't make Claire feel guilty for not being that awesome, but she's still better than anybody else. And being sarcastic and self-effacing makes it easier to handle that she's practically a child about having a stupid crush.

Not to mention the fact that, for all she criticizes Jeff and Troy and Rich, Claire doesn't really know Annie, either.

Oh, sure, she knows all kinds of versions of Annie. She knows Annie the gossiped about construct, and Annie who's been in a few of her classes and always has her hand up, and Annie who mud-wrestled with Britta to raise money for oil spill relief (and the embarrassment Paige drilled into Claire's head over throwing twenty-five bucks at the display because sure, the money was for a good cause but did Claire have to objectify her fellow women and lower herself to the same level as those disgusting, simple-minded guys).

Claire knows the imaginary Annie she writes stories about for her creative writing class. She knows that Annie best of all—but she only knows that Annie best of all because that Annie isn't real. She only exists in Claire's head and her various crops of five-page double-spaced nonsense.

The fact is simple: Claire doesn't really know _Annie_. Which makes Claire hug her binder that much closer, and lick her lips, and feel so, _so_ gross. Suddenly, the floor is the most interesting thing on the planet, because the floor doesn't think Claire's socially awkward and weird, and that's just enough comfort for Claire right now. And the floor's not still throwing up some totally full of shit monologue about how it doesn't judge Paige for being gay or define Paige by the fact that she's a lesbian.

Claire wants to point out just how bullshit everything that Britta's saying is, and how Britta's not really showing her open-mindedness that well if she only talks about Paige as _her lesbian friend_ , and maybe Britta could _actually_ try not reducing other people to their labels in some bid to make herself look progressive? Just a thought. She doesn't even need to look at the uncomfortable, anxious, twisted-up expression Annie's wearing to look for an impetus to speak. A mission to stand up for Annie when she's not standing up for herself, because that's kind of a good thing, right? Standing up for someone you like.

Except that, even when she looks at Annie's face, Claire keeps her mouth shut. She doesn't have any grounds to defend Annie when she can defend herself, so maybe she's just choosing not to do it for some reason. Probably something to do with how good a person she is.

Even if Claire had some kind of calling to defend Annie, though? She doesn't have a moral high ground to say anything from about what's going on here. Britta and Paige might not know as much as they think they do, but they know more than Claire. And even if Claire knew enough to criticize them, it's not as though she could knock on Britta in good conscience when she puts up with these same tirades from Paige. She also couldn't "defend" Annie when, in her position? Claire does the same thing she's doing.

It's not even limited to Claire smiling, and nodding, and taking whatever silliness Paige can come up with today. It's also in the part where Claire and Annie are standing right next to each other. And how they're smiling and nodding while Britta carries on, but not saying anything themselves or making much more noise than the occasional _hmm_. And how they're both trying for good posture but slouching at the hips and letting their shoulders slump because Britta is just that talented at cowing people. It's like looking in a funhouse mirror that gives Claire's reflection better hair, and a different color sweater, and a face that's pretty, instead of cute.

So, really, Claire has no place trying to stand up for Annie. She might not even appreciate that gesture, because aside from the appeal to drama, it'd be presumptuous, and hypocritical, and God, Claire feels gross for even thinking about doing it, what is _wrong_ with her.

Anyway, this probably just speaks to some other issues, ones that Annie doesn't need shoved into her life. All things considered, Claire's probably projecting the heaps of stuff she can't make herself say to Paige onto Britta. Which isn't fair because they're individuals and they're different. And maybe Claire should try actually talking to people when she's upset with them.

That's what her therapist would say, at least, and Doctor Benson definitely knows more than Claire does. It's her job to know more than Claire does. It's what Claire's parents' health insurance pays her to do.

Better yet: at least Britta finally has to leave. And it's for real this time. She's late for an appointment, one she totally forgot about. Claire wishes she were biting back on a smirk, but it takes too much effort just to look up and nod.

Rocking back and forth on the balls of her feet, Claire nods and waves "goodbye" to Britta as she wanders away, and now is when Claire should really find a spine or an excuse to leave. Either works.

She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. Sighs as she rolls her shoulders and puts her posture right again. Forces herself to turn so she's properly facing Annie. She opens her mouth, intent on letting whatever falls out of it happen, since it's not as though she's managed to be socially competent anywhere else today and why should she start now—

But, as Claire opens her eyes again, she stops. She slouches more than Britta made her slouch, so fully aware of how much she's gaping that trying to silently minimize it leaves her shaking her head. Quietly moving her lips around syllables that never quite form themselves, much less let Claire string them along into words. She feels like a dying fish. Probably looks like one, too.

It's nothing huge. Definitely not as bad as Claire's reaction would probably indicate. It's just that Annie's crossing her arms over her chest, glaring at the wall, and wearing a whole new expression. One that makes goosebumps prick up on the back of Claire's neck, and shuts her up better than Britta did but without putting as much work into that, and all around? Does not make sense on Annie Edison. Claire might be hallucinating this right now. Or maybe she hit her head and she's having some weird, soul-searching coma dream.

Because this is happening. That expression is _right there_ , on Annie's face like it belongs there, like it's always been there. And the fact that these are _facts_ , not opinions, makes Claire worry. Wonder if maybe this is all a dream anyway. Because she's still here and still alive, but been standing next to Annie for so long that she should've dropped dead from nerves.

Dreaming wouldn't really explain the look Annie has right now, though, because Claire would. It's… dark, Claire guesses? For lack of a better word? Annie's brow is furrowed and irreparably knotted up. She's scrunching up her nose and half-frowning, half-pouting. It's like Annie has a thunderstorm on her face. And it should look cute. It should look goddamn _adorable_ , like the sneer she gets when she corrects a professor in front of everyone, or the grumpy, affronted kitten face she gets when someone else corrects her.

But instead, there's this glint in Annie's eyes like gunmetal or the edge of a knife. And it's only by some miracle that Claire manages to say, "Are. …Annie? You okay?"

"Ohhh, I'm _fine_ ," she drawls. Lying, obviously. The sarcasm charges out of her like it's leaping out of a closet and chasing Scooby Doo. And Claire wonders if she should say something else first, but Annie has other things on her mind: "Just who does Britta even think she is? And who does Paige even think _she_ is? And I just…"

She trails off into some groaning, sighing noise that itself trails off, getting high-pitched and whining and really, stomach-turning-ly scary before Annie finally huffs and goes back to using words. "I'm so sorry, Claire," she says. "I don't even know Paige, I shouldn't be judging her over this… 'Britta makes me feel cooler than you because I've got a _lesbian friend_ , look at how accepting and COOL I am' thing. I'm sure she's really nice when you get to know her, right?"

Claire shrugs and mostly fails to smile. Her knees are doing that wobbly thing again, and her lungs feel like they're made of jello, and she should really be focusing on something else, but _Annie knows her name_. What crazy world in the back of a closet has she woken up in, with no memory of how she got there? Because _Annie Edison knows her name_ and that has to mean she's not in reality anymore.

But even though everything she's doing to save face feels half-hearted and precarious, like the tiniest thing will send it toppling over, Claire rolls her eyes. Shakes her head. Says, "Yeah, she is, mostly… You know. When she's not going on about how much more she knows than everybody else? And when she's not telling other people how they feel? Or other stuff like that… but her heart's in the right place, I guess?"

It sounds kind of pathetic when she says it aloud and outside of Doctor Benson's office. Not quite as pathetic as how _easy_ Claire's finding this whole talking to Annie thing. But still pretty pathetic. And Annie just sighs and gives Claire a sad, off-kilter smile that says, _Oh my God, I know exactly how you feel_ before she does so for herself.

"I mean, Britta's great, and I love her like a sister," Annie goes on, "but sometimes I could just… I don't even _know_ what I'd do, but it'd be _bad_." A sigh, and she shakes her head in frustration. "It's probably not a good thing to get so mad at your friends, is it?"

"I don't know, really?" Claire shrugs, scuffs her foot on the floor, and finds herself smiling, even though she knows there's no way that this is going to last. Talking to Annie's being too easy. And sharing frustrations with your friends behind their backs? Never works out well, in Claire's experience.

But she keeps talking anyway: "I mean, I get that kind of feeling about Paige a lot, too? Like when she acts like it's totally counterculture that she reads _Cosmo_ and pretends she doesn't?"

"Britta's the same way with _Vogue_ , except she only reads it when she steals it out of _my_ bag."

"Paige won't let me sit through _The Devil Wears Prada_ without telling me my crush on Meryl Streep is somehow appropriating not-straight women's experiences of being into other women? Or that it's setting the feminist movement back twenty years and I should feel terrible."

And this really shouldn't roll off the tongue so easily, because Claire's never told anyone about any of that. But Annie's smiling at Claire, even as she sighs, and rolls her eyes, and chirps: "Britta can't let me watch _Grey's Anatomy_ without saying that completely unromantic scenes in the hospital _morgue_ are full of the male gaze and don't I know I'm the worst for supporting that."

And as Claire comes back to that—"And because the _Iron Man_ movies were totally progressive and perfect and they single-handedly saved all the women everywhere, you know?"—she realizes that she's smiling, too. She's smiling so much that her face hurts.

"It's Kevin Smith movies, in Britta's case, but…" Annie laughs, shakes out her hair again. "I know exactly what you mean."

"It's just like, okay, Paige? I get it? You're the special-est special snowflake ever… just like everybody else. How about you sit down and we just… play Scrabble, or get coffee, or something that friends do without talking about how Scrabble is a tool of the patriarchy?"

"Britta wouldn't even let me say that. She'd give me a twenty-minute lecture about how patriarchy's not the right word, but she'd mispronounce all her polysyllabic, pseudo-feminist words."

"Because it's not like there's _really_ still a feminist movement or anything and she's just using it to look cool and guilt-trip people, right?"

"Oh, totally. But it'd be one thing if she were _consciously_ manipulating people. That takes effort, and work, and dedication. I could _respect_ that." Annie gets that glint in her eyes again, and a sardonic edge to her smirk, and it still looks so _weird_ on her, but… it's cool.

More than just cool. It's pretty awesome. Nothing Claire would've expected out of Annie, and easily a hundred times better. Not just because Claire doesn't feel nervous.

"But that's always the thing with Britta," Annie huffs. "She's not even trying to manipulate people. She's completely deluded, but she just always assumes she's right, and it's like… Oh, _wow_ , Britta! You have two guy friends who are dating each other and a friend who's bisexual, and you would know this if you _asked_ us or at least stopped assuming that we're straight, because I'm pretty sure that's just as bad as assuming that people are gay."

"I don't know? It might be? But for all the assuming things sucks? Paige didn't even believe me when I told her I'm bi."

"Of course not! Britta probably wouldn't believe me, either. Because if we're bi, then we're taking away their throne of being the most special and being right all the time."

"Even though they're totally not." Claire glances up at the clock and hates the stupid thing. Hates time. How can she go to class instead of staying here?

She has to go, and soon. _Really_ soon. Hanging around now will mean cutting it close, and being late is a risk she shouldn't take. She's already wasted her two skips for the semester to soothe Paige through a breakup and an awful cold—but if she wouldn't risk getting dropped a letter grade? Claire would stay right here with Annie. Just standing in front of the vending machines and getting all kinds of things off their chests. Things like:

"You know, if you think about it? They're probably wrong more often than they're right, but they have to _think_ that they're right. Or else everything's broken and the world doesn't make any sense."

"Exactly!" Annie sighs like it's been a long time coming, with the same heavy relief that Claire's feeling right now. "Just like it's such a big deal that you think your new friend Paige is a _lesbian_ that you have to tell us all about how much of a lesbian she is, _all the time_?"

"I guess we should probably tell them they're not lesbians before they do… I don't know." Claire shakes her head, and rolls her eyes, not sure if it's affectionate or judgmental or if she even cares that much. "Before they do something stupid that gets both of their feelings hurt."

Annie huffs and kicks at the floor. "They probably wouldn't even learn anything from it, if that happened."

"Probably not, but… uh." Claire needs to go. Like, now. And it's probably just in her distraction that she spits out, "D'you maybe want to go to the dance? With me? Together? And not just to babysit Paige and Britta—I mean, they probably need it, but… do you want to go like, as a date?"

Annie blinks at Claire for a moment. Then, she smiles and blushes bright pink. And as Claire makes a mad dash for class, she's not sure why she's grinning so much. Probably because Annie said yes, and knows her name, and they're going to the dance together.

But it sure doesn't hurt that talking to her is pretty easy after all.


End file.
